Multi-Store Addons for WooCommerce: An Ultimate Guide For Beginners

Introduction

WooCommerce is one of the most popular plugins for WordPress that turns your normal WordPress website into an e-commerce store. Furthermore, WooCommerce does this by adding e-commerce functionalities, such as shipping, payment options, product inventory, etc. to your WordPress website.

Woocommerce has the largest market share of any online store creator in the world. Furthermore, this popularity is due to 3 main reasons:

1. It is free
2. Used by the most popular platform to build a website, WordPress.
3. Huge development community with third-party support

Due to WooCommerce’s popularity, many e-commerce owners conduct their business through Woocommerce. Moreover, for a business that has multiple stores, warehouses, and products, it can be quite challenging to track every small detail, such as stock, sales prices, location-based payment methods, location-based shipping methods, etc. That is why the creators of the store locator, Agile Store Locator, have developed an exciting new plugin called the “Multi Store Addons for WooCommerce” which is designed to help store owners manage day-to-day operations for their WooCommerce store.

The “Multi Store Addons for WooCommerce” plugin is especially useful for WooCommerce owners who:

1. Sell multiple products from multiple stores
2. Store their products in multiple locations (stores, warehouses, etc.)
3. Ship their products worldwide

In this guide for the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”, we will be taking a closer look at this plugin. Exploring its key features. Seeing how it works. And most importantly, discovering how it can benefit business owners who do business through WooCommerce.

How it Works

Before we get into the key features of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”, it will be a good idea to first understand what this plugin does and how to use it.

Basically, the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” has 8 tabs:

1. Global Tab
2. Products Tab
3. Notifications Tab
4. Labels Tab
5. Shipping Zones Tab
6. Payment Methods Tab
7. Import/Export Tab
8. Shipping Costs Tab

Each of these tabs performs certain functions that will help you manage product inventory, shipping, payment methods, product pricing, and so on. 

Let’s take a closer look at each of these tabs, and see what options they can offer you.

1- Global Tab

The “Global” tab manages the frontend aspects of your WooCommerce store. Moreover, the “Global” tab can be used to add or remove certain functionalities to your WooCommerce store that will give you and your customers a better buying/selling experience.

From the “Global” tab you can perform the following functions:

1. Display multiple stock locations on your store page
2. Show products that are out-of-stock in certain locations
3. Display discounted prices
4. Detect your customers’ current location
5. Enable the usage of “shipping zones”
6. Enable store-specific payment methods
7. Assign how many stores will appear when a store is searched for

2- Products Tab

On the “Products” tab you can enable or disable functions that relate to product prices. For example, one feature called “Enable Products Pricing” allows you to display different prices for a product for each location (store) in which the product is available. 

Having different product prices in different stores is especially useful if you are selling the product in multiple locations. In addition, if you need to price one location’s product higher or lower than the other. For example, you might have a store in a place where there are high taxes or tariffs. In this case, you can set the product price a bit higher for this location, than for other locations where you might sell the same product. 

3- Notifications Tab

The “Notifications” Tab is one of the most important tabs on the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” because it helps make sure you don’ run out of products to sell.

The “Notifications” tab for sending two types of crucial emails to your registered email address:

1. Nearly Out-of-Stock
2. Out-of-Stock

Both these email notifications are crucial in making sure that you don’t run out of products to sell. Furthermore, once you receive any one of these emails, you can immediately start making arrangements to replenish your stock.

The “Notifications” tab, therefore, frees you up from constantly having to monitor your stock levels. Instead, you will be able to focus on other tasks, and not worry about running out of stock until you get a “Nearly Out-of-Stock” email.

4- Labels Tab

The “Translations” tab allows users to change the text of certain words and phrases on their WooCommerce store into similar words or phrases. For Example, the default message for in-stock products is “In Stock”. However, by using the “Notifications” tab, you will be able to change the “In Stock “ message text into, let’s say, “Product Available”.

5- Shipping Zones Tab

 One of the most useful tabs in the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” is the “Shipping Zones” Tab.

A “shipping zone” is a “package” that you as the e-commerce owner can create which can be used to ship products using specific delivery methods. Moreover, a “shipping zone” usually consists of: 

1. A Zone Name
2. A Zone Region
3. Assigned Shipping Methods for the Zone

“Shipping Zones” are a useful feature of WooCommerce because they allow you to streamline shipping to a certain degree for certain locations. Moreover, once you have created a shipping zone using WooCommerce, you can use the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” to assign stores to the “shipping zones” you have created.

With your stores’ assigned specific shipping zones to ship products to, you will now have an easier time delivering products to your customers because specific regions will have one or more dedicated stores to deliver your products to. Moreover, this is especially useful in situations where you have a store(s) that are close to a particular shipping region.

For example, let’s suppose you have 3 stores “A”, “B” and “C” from where you deliver products to your customer. In addition, you have the following two “shipping zones” created on Woocommerce:

1. Shipping Zone 1 – USA, Free Shipping 
2. Shipping Zone 2 – Canada, Flat rate

Moreover, let’s assume stores “A”, “B” and “C”  are located in the US, while store “C” is located close to the US-Canadian border. In this scenario, to have a more efficient and cost-effective delivery system, you can use the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” to assign stores “A” and “B” to “Shipping Zone 1”. Now all the orders you receive from the US will be fulfilled by stores “A” and “B”. Moreover,  since store “C” is closer to Canada. Therefore, it is more suited to deliver products to Canada at a lower cost. In this case, you can assign store “C” to “Shipping Zone 2”. Now all the orders you receive from Canada will be fulfilled by store “C”.

As you can see, you can create a highly efficient shipping network by using shipping zones in combination with the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” ability to assign specific stores for certain shipping locations.

6- Payment Methods Tab

Similar to assigning stores to various shipping locations, you can also assign stores to accept various payment methods.

On the WooCommerce plugin, you can enable or disable certain methods to accept payments from your customers. The payment methods include:

1. Credit/Debit Card Payment
2. Direct Bank Transfer
3. Cheque 
4. Cash-on-Delivery

One acceptable payment methods have been defined for your e-commerce store, you can use the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” to assign individual stores to accept specific payment methods.

For example, if you have a “Cash-On-Delivery” payment method enabled, you can assign stores to accept cash-on-delivery as a payment method for delivering products. Moreover, assigning stores to accept certain payment methods will streamline your overall cash flow because you will have control over which payment method can be used in which store. This is especially useful in situations where your store has limited payment options available. For example, if one of your stores only has the ability to process non-cash payments, then you can assign this store to “Credit/Debit Card Payment”, “Cheque”, and “Direct Bank Transfer” payment methods. Thus ensuring only these types of payment methods are used at this particular store.

7- Import/Export Tab

The next tab on this list is the ever-crucial “Import/Export” tab.

The Import/Export tab allows users of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” to import stores and products data using CSV files. Therefore, with just a few clicks you will be able to migrate your entire WooCommerce data onto our plugin. Moreover, once you have uploaded and imported the products/stores data, you will be all set to begin using the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”.

You can even export the CSV files containing your store/product data for the “Import/Export” tab. Overall, the “Import/Export” will be one of the most used tabs for users of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce

8- Shipping Costs Tab

The last tab on our list is the “Shipping Costs” tab.

The “Shipping Costs” tab streamlines cost calculations that are associated with shipping products under different conditions. This is done by automatically calculating the required shipping fee based on distance, product weight, and order total. In addition, users can use the “Shipping Cost” tab to create various shipping “rules” that will be used to calculate the shipping cost. Moreover, whenever shipping a product fulfills the conditions of a certain “rule”, that “rule” will be used to calculate the shipping cost.

For example, let’s suppose a user creates a rule with the following parameters:

1. Condition: Distance
2. Min: 0
3. Max: 1000
4. Base Cost: 5
5. Cost/Metric: 10
6. Priority: 1

Now whenever a product is shipped between 0 to 1000 distance units, the above base cost, and cost/metric will be used to calculate the final shipping fee. In addition, the final shipping fee will be displayed on the checkout page.

Key Features

Let’s take a look at some of the key features of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”, and see how these features can be useful for online store owners.

1- Handle Stock Across Multiple Store Locations

For online store owners who have multiple physical locations (stores or warehouses) where they keep their inventory, the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” is a must-have plugin because from this plugin users can manage their entire product stock across all their stores. 

That’s right! With the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”, online store owners will no longer need to have separate platforms to manage product stock in individual stores. Now it can all be done from the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin

The advantage of managing all your product stock from the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin is that you will be able to easily and efficiently send, receive, order, etc. stock for each of your store locations.

2- Assign Stores to WooCommerce Products

With the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin, you will also be able to decide which stores will sell which products.

3- Enable Customers to Choose From Which Store to Receive Their Product

Users of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin can provide their customers with a slightly better sopping experience by giving them the choice to select from where their product will be shipped from. Moreover, by providing your customers with this choice you increase their satisfaction which might encourage them to become recurring customers.

4- Display Store-Wise Pricing and Product Availability

You will be able to show different prices for the same product that is available in different stores.

The advantage of displaying store-wise pricing, and not having uniform pricing, is that you can sell your products at different prices without having to compensate for overall profit. 

This is especially useful in situations where a product might be more expensive to manufacture or procure in a certain location, or if a product is difficult to ship from a particular store. In this case you can display a higher price for this product as a result of logistical and manufacturing challenges.

5- Multiple Payment Methods for Each Store

You can assign multiple payment methods, such as card payments, cash-on-delivery, bank transfers, cheque payments, etc. to each of your stores. Thus ensuring that you have all the options possible to process payments, which will ensure a healthy cash flow for your business.

6- Create Shipping Zones for Each Store Location

By assigning stores to a shipping zone you will be able to have a fast and efficient shipping network that will make every store (manager) know which shipping locations are assigned to them. As a result, your products will be promptly dispatched to your customer which will increase their overall satisfaction with your business.

In addition, you will eliminate the problem of having to constantly decide from which store to ship your products because, with the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin, you will be able to connect each of your stores to a shipping location. Thus ensuring all sipping operations go smoothly.

7- Geolocate Customers’ Locations to Deliver from the Closest Store

To make your shipping tasks even easier, if you have many stores assigned to a particular location, then you can geolocate a customer’s current location, and send their products from the closest store.

8- Compatible with Website Builders and Plugins

The “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin can work with all major website builders and other plugins. Therefore, you won’t have to worry too much about issues such as website compatibility or plugin conflicts.

9- Location Picker at Checkout

Users of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin have the option to add a “Location Picker” at the checkout page.

Once enabled, the location picker can be used by your customers to add their preferred location by using a map. Moreover, once a location is picked the billing address fields are also automatically updated.

The “location picker at checkout” is an extremely useful feature that your customers will appreciate because it saves them from having to fill in their address manually. In addition, through the location picker, both you and your customers will be able to receive and send accurate location details respectively.

10- Local Pickup Store Selection

By enabling the “local pickup” option on your website, you can provide your customers with the option to pick up their selected products from one of your stores by themselves. As a result, you will not have to worry about shipping products to customers who select the “local pickup” option at checkout.

11- Store Selection at Product Level or Cart Level

From the “Agile Stores Addons for WoCommerce” plugin, you can add a store selection widget on either the products page(s) or on the cart page.

Once the store selection widget is enabled, a list of stores will be displayed from where a particular product can be shipped. As a result,  your customers will be able to select a store from where they want a product to be delivered.

Benefits for Store Owners, Online Retailers, and Warehouse Managers

 As you can see the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin is designed with one goal in mind: to make life easier for online store owners, online retailers, and warehouse managers by providing a single platform to manage all their product inventory. 

The “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin is especially useful for online store owners who have the following:

1. Multiple physical locations (store, warehouse, etc.) from where they ship products
2. Products stock spread across many physical locations
3. Delivery locations in multiple regions

Let’s take a closer look at how the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin can benefit all parties involved with using this plugin.

1- Online Store Owners/ Online Retailers

Managing inventory in a store can be very challenging. In addition, it is even more difficult to manage inventory across multiple stores. Therefore, the main benefit the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin can provide online store owners/online retailers is that the plugin can make a managing inventory (adding, removing, replenishing, pricing, re-pricing, discount pricing, shipping, etc.) extremely easily and intuitive for store owners.

Moreover, inventory management is made easy through the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin by providing store owners will a single platform from where they can control the fine details of selling products through multiple locations. These details include:

1. A view of all product stock across all store locations
2. Assigning stores to different shipping regions
3. Assigning different payment methods to different stores to facilitate smooth transactions
4. Different product prices at different store locations
5. Delivering products from the closet store

Using the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin makes managing inventory across multiple stores fast, efficient and worry-free.

2- Physical Store/ Warehouse Managers

The “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin will not benefit store owners, but also the store/warehouse managers who work under them.

Firstly, by using the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin your store managers will also have an easier time dispatching products because each of your stores will be assigned to particular shipping zones. Therefore, everyone will be on the same page as to which store will deliver to which location.

Secondly, your store manager will not have to worry about informing you about running out of stock because you, as the store owner, will be able to keep a constant eye on the stock through the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin which can be updated with all the latest product stock information.

Conclusion

The “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce” plugin is an exciting new plugin that makes business operations easier for store owners (online or physical) by providing an elegant platform from where many logistical operations can be micro-managed.

Thanks for reading this article. We hope it helped you understand a lot about the working of the “Agile Stores Addons for WooCommerce”.